


Sweet Music Playing in the Dark

by fuzzballsheltiepants



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: AFTG Summer Exchange, Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, First Meetings, Gay Bar, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-12
Updated: 2019-08-12
Packaged: 2020-08-19 21:24:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20216509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzballsheltiepants/pseuds/fuzzballsheltiepants
Summary: Erik Klose decided to spend a year in the U.S. to further his career; he didn't quite anticipate how alone he would feel.  Cue a visit to a gay bar, a very clueless straight girl, and a very hot knight in shining armor coming to his rescue, and suddenly he's not quite so lonely.





	Sweet Music Playing in the Dark

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Idnis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Idnis/gifts).

> This is a gift for the incredibly talented @Idnis for the AFTG Summer Exchange! The prompt was: Meet cutes! Like: "I'm pretending to be your boyfriend because you looked very uncomfortable with that person at the bar hitting on you", which I thought was freaking adorable so I ran with it with Nicky/Erik. I had some fun turning the dynamic between the two of them on its side a bit.
> 
> Thanks as always to @tntwme for the beta!
> 
> Title from Hozier's Almost (Sweet Music)

The bass was a heartbeat. Erik’s body wanted to match it as he wove through dancing bodies towards the bar. It had always been that way with music; he belonged to himself until something caught his ear, then he was helpless, looking for ways to surrender.

Someone vacated a stool just as he reached the bar, and he slipped into it, his fingers tapping his thigh in time with the beat. Both bartenders were occupied, and he craned his neck to study the assortment of cocktails listed on the board above them. Many of them were universal, but there were some with peculiar, intriguing names. He wondered what they were, if he would recognize any of their German names or if Americans drank different types of things altogether.

Maybe he should’ve taken his new coworkers up on their offer to take him out for drinks, at least once. Get the lay of the land, wasn’t that the expression? He still didn’t know what made him say no, no more than he knew what had drawn him here tonight. It wasn’t like he was looking for a hookup, that had never been his style. Maybe it was just solidarity he was seeking, an island of gay in a sea of earnest straight. 

Yet despite the music and the bodies around him, he still felt—alone.

One of the bartenders freed up and came over with a smile. “What’s your poison?”

Shit. Erik still hadn’t decided which of the unfamiliar drinks he wanted to risk. He ended up wimping out and ordering one of the beers on tap, one he recognized as at least drinkable. The bartender poured it with an easy motion and slid it over with another smile, and at least then Erik had something to do with his hands.

He sipped the beer while watching the people out on the floor. The feel here was definitely different from at his favorite bar at home: louder, brighter, more crowded. A group of women in matching outfits were bouncing up and down in the center of the crush, surrounded by a mix of people of all genders grinding on each other to the beat. With each blink, each flash of colored lights, Erik’s eye caught on someone new.

Then—the one person he couldn’t look away from, dark-haired and dark-eyed and dancing like the music had taken over his soul, like it was part of his muscles and bones and heart. He was dancing with a short blond guy, not close grinding like most of the others but they were clearly there together. Erik sighed and swiveled around to face the bar. 

This was a mistake.

The beer was two-thirds empty when a body pushed up beside him and leaned over the bar, signalling for attention. Both bartenders were occupied, but one of them nodded at the woman in acknowledgement before turning back to the customer they were serving. The woman sighed ostentatiously and looked at Erik, tucking her hair behind her ear. “This place is fun but the service is shit.”

Erik glanced around; there was nobody else she could be talking to. “It’s busy tonight.”

“Ooh, love the accent! Where are you from?”

“Germany,” he said cautiously.

“That’s so cool! What brings you to the States?”

The bartender finished with his order and came over, but the girl didn’t even notice. Erik cleared his throat and gestured with his chin across the bar; she barely glanced at the man. “I’ll have a Sand in the Crack,” she said, a bit rudely. The bartender didn’t even seem surprised as he nodded and grabbed a glass.

Erik looked back across the dance floor, hoping the girl would forget about him. The one guy was dancing with a group now, moving like the music flowed, his partner bobbing next to him. A sigh escaped Erik; he wondered if it sounded as wistful as it felt. 

“You here for school or something?” The girl’s voice penetrated his thoughts, and he shook his head to clear it.

“Work.”

She hummed, a little smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “I’m a student,” she said, not that he had asked. “PSU.”

He nodded for lack of a better response, and took another pull at his beer. The bartender slid the girl’s glass across the bar, one eyebrow raised at Erik, who gave him a tiny, helpless shrug and received a sympathetic grin in response. 

“You wanna dance?” The girl was lipping at her straw in what may have been supposed to be a seductive way, looking up at him through eyelashes too thick to be real. 

“Thank you, but no,” Erik said, draining his glass. The clink of it against the counter sounded like freedom, and he fished around in his pocket for his wallet.

“Wanna get out of here then?” 

Erik froze with his wallet halfway out of his pocket. “No, thank you,” he said again, feeling his ears warm. 

“I’m a lot of fun, I promise.” One finger traced the low neckline of her top and he found himself watching its progress, wondering if straight men actually found that appealing.

“Sorry, I’m gay,” he blurted out.

Incredibly, she scoffed. “How do you know if you’ve never tried it?”

He gaped at her; across the counter, the bartender did the same over the shots he was pouring. “Am I wr—isn’t this a gay bar?”

She rolled her eyes. “Well, yeah, but so? Half of us here are straight.”

Before Erik could answer with something that would no doubt keep him up nights, he felt an arm drop around his shoulders. “Babe!” A strong southern drawl sounded in his ear. “When you gonna come dance with me? You know I’m dying for some of those sweet sweet moves.”

Erik looked up to see the hot guy he’d been watching smiling down at him, a little flicker of what looked like concern in his eyes. The girl glared daggers at him. “You could have told me you had a boyfriend, instead of letting me make a fool out of myself.”

His mouth dropped open in shock, and she stood in a huff and stormed off. Her straw swirled slowly in the sunset-colored liquid before coming to rest against the edge of the glass. The man removed his arm from Erik’s shoulders and dropped into her vacated seat, wrinkling his nose as he shoved the drink away from him. 

“Sorry, hope I didn’t stress you out or anything,” the man said, “y’all just looked really uncomfortable.” His voice was warm and honey-sweet, matching the smile that lit up his eyes. “I’m Nicky by the way.”

“Erik.” He wondered if he should offer to shake hands, but decided that would ruin the ruse if the girl was still around. “Thank you for rescuing me.”

Nicky grinned. “I’ve always wanted to be a knight in shining armor.” 

The bartender slid a shot glass of something across the bar at him, and Nicky turned the thousand-watt smile on him. “Thanks, Roland! Aaron and Andrew polished off the tray already.”

Roland laughed. “I’m betting you did some of the work there.”

Nicky lifted one shoulder in an easy shrug. “Less than you’d think.” He turned back to Erik, something almost shy creeping across his face. “Uh, you new around here?”

Erik felt his own mouth twitching. “That obvious?”

“No, no, it’s just, I used to work here until a couple months ago, I know most of the regulars. I’d definitely remember you.” He grimaced. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. I mean, I kind of did, but...ugh, just tell me to shut up.”

But Erik found himself laughing, and marveling at how it felt. Like waking up from an endless dream of darkness to find the sun just beginning to rise. He wondered if he had taken a single easy breath since getting on that plane in Stuttgart. “Would your boyfriend mind if I asked you to dance?”

“Boyfriend?” Nicky looked sincerely startled, and Roland snorted from where he was filling a glass from a tap. 

“Yes?” Erik hadn’t meant it to come out as a question and he chuckled at himself under his breath. Evidently moving to a new continent did not suddenly make him suave around cute guys. He pointed across the floor to where the short blond guy was standing by the tables, his back to them. 

Nicky crowed with laughter. “That’s my cousin. And my other cousin, though you can’t really see him from here. Not that you’d be able to tell,” he added, gesturing to himself. There was something in the movement that made Erik take a second look at him, a shadow behind his eyes as he glanced in the direction of his—cousins, some sort of hidden pain. Erik didn’t understand, but he found himself wanting to. In that one look, he felt like the door had cracked open to some sort of secret room. No, bigger; a museum, full of beauty that was sometimes glorious, sometimes heartbreaking; something painful and worthy that few were granted admission to. 

He wondered if everybody in Nicky’s life looked at the facade and thought that was all there was.

Then he blinked, and the moment was gone, and Nicky was smiling that easy smile at him again, and Erik thought he would do anything to be allowed behind that door. The song shifted into something familiar from his teenage years, and his heart sped up to match the beat. He held out his hand, and Nicky laughed and shrugged as he took it.

They couldn’t hear themselves talk over the pounding bass, but that didn’t matter. Nicky was glorious to watch, his whole soul given over to the music; even more glorious to feel up against him, the heat of his body, the controlled rhythm of his movements. Erik’s thoughts went into quite a filthy direction as he let his hands settle on Nicky’s hips, and he wondered if Nicky would come home with him that night, if he asked.

Probably, if he was being honest with himself, as Nicky leaned into him. It wasn’t like he struck out often. It was easy to picture Nicky in his bed, moving just like that, his summer-sweet voice moaning his name. 

The song blended into the next one as he considered it, then the next, and all Erik could think of was that eventually morning would come, and Nicky would walk away, and his apartment would be emptier than ever. He forced his hands to release Nicky’s hips.

Nicky looked up at him, lips parted, face flushed, and it took every ounce of willpower not to bend down the few inches and kiss him. Erik took a step back, and something twisted in his chest when he saw Nicky’s face fall. He didn’t know why he cared this much, but he couldn’t stop himself from threading his fingers through Nicky’s before turning towards the door.

“I’m gonna have to talk to my cousins,” Nicky shouted in the direction of his ear as they neared the door. Erik shook his head and pushed out into the warm summer evening. They could still hear the music out here, but it was muted; just a part of the symphony, alongside the hum of cars on the road and the nighttime chorus of some sort of insect he couldn’t quite place.

“I couldn’t hear myself think,” Erik said, leaning back against the brick and gulping down lungfuls of air. 

Nicky joined him, peering up at the sky. Only a few stars were visible through the haze of city lights, and Erik tried to figure out which ones they were. “Sometimes that’s why I like it here,” Nicky said after a while. Another glimpse through the keyhole of that door.

“I want to take you home with me,” Erik admitted. He couldn’t help but smile at the faint blush that darkened Nicky’s cheeks under the parking lot lights. “But I don’t want a one-night stand.”

“I—” Nicky stopped, swallowing hard, eyes trained on the pavement below their feet. “You don’t want to get involved with me.”

“Why not?” Nicky shook his head, turning to go in. Erik raised a hand to stop him, but didn’t touch him; after a moment, Nicky settled back against the wall, his shoulder fractionally closer to Erik’s. “Why not, Nicky?” 

“I’m a mess.” He laughed, as if the sound would somehow lessen the pain behind the words. “If you knew…”

“Aren’t we all, under the surface?” Nicky shook his head, and Erik could feel him pulling away, though his body didn’t move. “You might be a mess, but you’re kind enough to help out a total stranger. That’s the kind of mess I like.”

Nicky glared up at him, eyes tear-bright and defiant. “You’re full of shit, you know that?” He held out his hand; Erik stared down at it in confusion and Nicky let it drop. “You wanna know what kind of mess I am? My parents kicked me out when I was seventeen. I adopted my cousins when I was eighteen; they’re only four years younger than me, and they—they’ve been through hell. I’m a parent of nineteen-year-olds, Erik. I’m twenty-three and I just started college last week. You really think that sounds like a good kind of mess? You’d be the first.”

Erik couldn’t find his voice in the ocean of pain that washed over him on the tide of Nicky’s words. Nicky watched him for a moment, then gave a grim sort of nod. “Thought so.” He pushed off the wall and turned to the door.

“Wait.”

Nicky paused with one hand on the door handle, a patient sort of weariness settling on his features. “You don’t have to say anything. Believe me, I get it.”

Erik fumbled around and managed to pull out his phone without dropping it. He unlocked it and held it out. “Put your number in. If you don’t want me to text you, you can give me a fake, I’ll understand.”

They stared at each other for so long Erik’s phone started to go back to sleep. He tapped the button to keep it awake, and finally Nicky took it with a hesitant hand. Erik didn’t take his eyes off Nicky’s face while he typed, trying desperately to use these last moments to memorize every detail. The way his dark eyes, warm almost in spite of himself, glanced up between long lashes; the curve of his mouth that wanted to smile, even in the face of pain; the curl of black hair against smooth brown skin; the tiny indent of a forgotten scar on his cheek. Erik wanted to kiss that scar, to learn its history, and the fact that he probably never would…

Nicky handed his phone back and disappeared through the door before Erik could say anything. He looked down at his screen, more than halfway expecting it to just show a line of zeroes, or 123-456-7890 or something. But the number looked legit, and the name Nicky had entered made a wide grin spread across his face.  **Hot Fucked-Up Clubguy** . 

He called it before he could lose his nerve. When it connected, he could hear the club music, loud in his right ear and muffled through the wall in his left. “Didn’t I tell you I like being the one who’s the knight in shining armor?” Nicky yelled through the line.

Erik laughed, the pavement barely there beneath his feet, the brick a feather mattress behind his back. “Never said you weren’t!” he shouted back. 

There was a pause, where just the music sounded through the phone. “You’re not going to try to save me?” Nicky asked.

“You don’t seem like you need to be saved.” Another pause, while he tapped his fingers against his phone and tried to find his courage. “Maybe dinner, though? Tomorrow?”

“That—yeah, dinner sounds great.” 

Erik drove back to his apartment with the radio off, the song he and Nicky had danced to echoing in his head. It followed him through to his bedroom, filling the blankness of the space, chasing away the shadows of loneliness that lurked in the corners. He could just about hear Nicky’s laugh in his ear, feel his body under his palms. As he closed the blinds and slipped between his sheets, he let himself surrender to that distant familiar beat, to the hope of tomorrow.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm not 100% sure I succeeded in this being cute, but hopefully it's at least a meet-sweet. Comments and kudos are greatly appreciated, even if I struggle to reply to comments for anxiety reasons I cherish each and every one! If you wanna come say hi feel free to hit me up [on Tumblr](https://fuzzballsheltiepants.tumblr.com) anytime


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